Author: Kelley Farrell

Letters from inside my head

Give Yourself A Break

I want to share a secret with you guys.

I’m exhausted.

All the time.

I sit at work sometimes nearly falling asleep at my desk.

I’m not always like this. Sometimes it can be attributed to depression but sometimes I just have to take a break.

A couple weeks ago my alarm went off and try as I might, I just could not haul myself out of bed.

I laid in bed so long my dogs protested their lack of outside time and food.

I laid in bed so long my daughter woke up and thought “maybe it’s Saturday” (it was not).

I laid in bed so long my normally dark mornings turned light and my alarm cycled through all the snoozes and all the alarms I set.

Continue reading “Give Yourself A Break” →

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Fictional Days

I personally love writing fiction. When I first started writing it was stories, never poetry, that I scribbled out. I don’t think I put enough stories or flash fiction on my blog.

In a way I don’t imagine I’ll ever actually try to publish poetry so I have no reason to keep it for myself. I guess that’s why so much ends up on the blog and so little of my stories.

Fiction can take on any form though, it doesn’t have to be a story. I’ve read some amazing works here on WordPress that were fictional pieces in poem form.

Here’s a fiction example that I wrote today. I found a photo prompt with a requirement of 100 words or less.

That’s a tough one! You have to be really effective with your words when they are limited.

I’m not sure I made it work that well but without further ado:

When I was a little girl I pressed my nose against the glass of my dad’s old Volkswagen as we passed under bridges in the city. I puffed great smokey blasts of fog to draw little hearts and “hellos” in as the sleeping men tossed in their bags.

“Dad, why don’t we help them?”
“They have to help themselves first.”

There was a woman beneath the bridge today snapping pictures of our homeless communities. Preserving our tents and bags in rough black and white photos for exhibit.

“Don’t you want to help yourself?”

I hear they feed you in jail.

camera-ted-strutz
Ted Strutz

 

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Second Chances and Fairy Tales, True Loves Will

I’ve struggled with this all week which is surprising considering the amount of poetry and prose about love present on my personal blog.

At the end of the day, I write about ultimately giving true love a second chance.

It seems awfully romantic to me and I’m a romantic at heart.

The idea that two people can come back together when it’s real … well it just hits like an arrow to the heart huh? (ha-ha-ha).

Truthfully, I’m also awfully jaded. Would I love for second chances to be reality? Absolutely. But life rarely works out in cinematic proportions.

Rather we trudge through burdened by our fears, expectations, beliefs about reality and reality of our beliefs. Those fairy tale endings never end up happening, no matter how much we will them to leap from our dreams into every day life.

I would love to write a poem for you all about true love and fairy tales or about fairy tales that fall apart but that would make reality all that much more real.

For now I prefer to deal in fantasy. I know reality will be waiting for me.

So, this week I leave you with this piece which was originally published on my blog in Nov. 2017

I Can’t Keep Count

I can’t keep count
Of the moments
That have passed me by.
Each one sinking in like a hammer
To the heart,
Cracking the spirit,
Threatening to tear the soul.
It’s a mystery to me
Why I am pulled so.
Moments in time,
Easily forgotten.
But I can’t keep count
Of the dreams I have
Or the nights I lie awake
When I feel that stirring,
Churning and rising,
From the places I strained
To hide it.
I can’t keep count
Of the mysteries
You inspire in me;
Of the memories
You awaken in me,
Like ancient spirits
Springing forth,
Speaking a language
Cryptic and romantic.
Mostly I just can’t keep count
Of the moments
I wish you were here
With me.

 

Wonder

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Maybe I Should’ve Been A Musician

This week we’ve been tasked with writing about a book, or the book, that inspired us to write.

I’ve read books that I came away from with “oh my god if I could write like that!” Maybe I even sat down and tried to imitate their style of story telling for a minute.

But when I tried to think of a book that inspired me to write or one that inspires me to write … I don’t have one.

Writing is something I’ve done since I was little, practically since I learned how to write.

I remember studying my childhood books to learn the direction they opened so I could staple my copy paper books together the right way.

I remember reading the back summaries of stories and working to craft my own. In my mind those things made my little copy paper books into legitimate things of fiction.

I had to illustrate them too. I wasn’t good at drawing but I gave it my best shot.

Eventually I gave up on illustrations and stuck to painting the pictures with words.

When I think of words that inspire me to write though I almost never go to lines in books.

Don’t get me wrong, there are amazing passages in books and maybe this means I don’t read enough …

On Friday, when I realized I needed to get on writing this, I racked my mind, “words that inspire you then, what are they?”

I was sitting in traffic on the interstate when, as if answering invisible questions, this line played over my car stereo:

Like the moment when the brakes lock and you slide towards the big truck you stretch the frozen moments with your fear.

It’s not an inspiring line, some may even say it’s not even a particularly good one, but set to the typical Floydesqe soundscape it strikes something in me every time I hear it.

Similarly, I doubt I could ever really choose a favorite song but if I had to decide on a top however many list “Hey You” would be solidly on it.

The entire song lyrically hits me every time I hear it.

I can’t think of a book that inspired me to write but I can pull lyrics from my brain all day long.

Another line that has been with me since high school comes from a now defunct rock band. This line has followed me from being scrawled in a notebook, to being a myspace tagline, to being on my facebook page. It’s still on my facebook page albeit I doubt anyone remembers there’s a “quotes” section with that kind of stuff in it anymore.

Proven in theory your heart can be lost by the brain.

There’s just something about song lyrics, they manage to grab you however subtly and plant an image into your mind with limited space and time.

Our attention span isn’t what we like to imagine it is.

We’re so used to life grabbing us forcefully with bright colors, loud noises and quickly moving in-your-face images. We miss the small moments that are worth just as much of our attention.

That may be why I can’t think of a book for inspiration.

Maybe this is why I can never seem to finish writing anything longer than a short story.

Maybe I should’ve been a musician instead.

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What Happened Here?

A while ago I wrote a post about rock n’ roll and embracing chaos.

Last year I started a post about time slipping away and treasuring moments and memories over stuff but I never finished it.

If you’ve read any of my writing you know time has kind of been a theme.

Time slipping by, un-noticed until it’s far too late, and the regret that comes with that.

I’ve always been fascinated with time, the way it passes and the way people use it.

When I inevitably end up in those “what super power would you have” conversations (because doesn’t everybody have those?) my answer has always been the ability to freeze time.

Not to save lives, not to commit crimes (I mean, those are up for grabs too) but to wander aimlessly and see what other people are doing with it.

Because I’m a weirdo like that.

It’s just always struck me as odd that time moves in the way it does. Ever propelling forward, slipping through cracks while we sit there and watch it, wondering when it will stop.

We seem to forget that it’s not going to stop, at least as far as our understanding of space and time currently go.

We all run the risk of waking up one day, older versions of the selves we thought we were, and asking “what happened here?”

Where did we go wrong?

You know what people on their death beds often say?

They wish they had fewer regrets.

That they had done the things they wanted when they had the time.

It’s not really a secret that these fleshy bone enclosures our souls are encapsulated in have expiration dates.

Some expire sooner than others; some completely without warning.

The great question no one wants to answer is what would you do if you found your date was coming up sooner rather than later?

Change, it’s the greatest fear we have and existing in the chaos is probably our greatest challenge.

Perhaps the best thing we can do is allow ourselves to feel it.

If you want to travel, do it.

If you want to do something great but have been scared of failing, know that failure is just part of the journey and do it anyway.

If you want to tell someone what they mean to you, even if the last time you spoke was in anger, do it. They may not be here tomorrow.

And you’ll be left asking, “what happened here?”

Simplify

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Fluorescent Darkness

I was 12 when it happened, you know, when the world ended. Or began. I suppose it depends on how you look at it.

One moment we were herds shuffling down linoleum hallways between lockers and first crushes. We navigated the noise of life with all the certainty placed in the palms of our hands.

Then, without warning, no sirens or drills, it was dark. It was quiet.

We underestimated the background noise provided by the constant buzz to our lives back then. When it disappeared …

First it was the lights, cars, planes tumbling from the sky. It was our music, our chatter … our constant incessant updates.

Then it was our food, our water … It was an unraveling death sentence. A sickness seemingly innocent then all at once deadly.

Finally, they came. Rescue, freedom from the silence at last. We were promised a return to some kind of normalcy. Communities with restored power, communication, electricity … in a way.

“Don’t look back.” They heralded us towards golden futures without so much as a question, such as we were, the brainwashed masses.

Behind us the past glowed orange and red, lighting the skies with prophecies we were too far gone to read. They had to maintain control, we had to understand.

There was something, they said, something in our past that lead us down this path. We had to begin again, anew.

We blindly marched on towards unseen futures while our pasts smoldered.

Things are never as they seem.

Inside the walls there is a false sense of security, there is a life afflicted by noise. Those comforts we so long believed we couldn’t survive without are built into our very beings. We are tracked, hunted, all within the confines of a walled city.

There’s no need to read. No need to learn. Simply watch the bright colors, listen to their world turn. It rolls over us with propaganda hate and news that’s cut and paste.

I have no reason to believe I will live to pass this down. Resistance is a death sentence here but every night more sidle to our doors. Tears in their eyes with stories of families denied.

We exist in the shadows, under the cover of night and as I write our numbers grow.

To our soldiers, because that is what you are, no longer children, no longer drones.

Take peace in the silence. They fill our heads with noise. We gave them the blueprint long ago, all they needed was to refine it to an art.

The world still turns. The seasons change, flowers bloom, die then rise again. Keep a flower, illegal it may be, to remind you. There is so much more beyond what we’re allowed to see.

Help one another, we are your brothers and sisters. This resistance is your home. They are well versed, divide and conquer, they knew well.

Finally, everything from before is gone, so they say. Our stories still exist, we can write them down again. It may be by candle light under the cover of night. We have to hide but we don’t have to exist in this fluorescent darkness forever.

Blink

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Blissfully Unaware

This week on The Perfectly Imperfect Bunch it’s been a little weird. We’ve been afflicted with various illnesses and other life like responsibilities. Naturally we decided to write about weird things, weird encounters or whatever.

I had all kinds of stuff in my head. Demons, vampires, demon hunters that were actually nerdy high school kids … psh, original right?

When I sat down to actually write something weird, well, I was in a weird mood and none of the above came out. Instead it was this:

Continue reading “Blissfully Unaware” →

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I Let My Creativity Drown (And It Didn’t Come Back to Haunt Me)

Have you guys listened to the Kubo and the Two Strings soundtrack? You should.

I had a thought of putting the “I don’t wanna” image up then just saying “so I didn’t” in this post. I’m not going to do that to you guys (but I coulda ….) That’s only going to mean something to people who are obsessed with Rio

Ok, anyway, I did write a blog post. Here it is ….

Continue reading “I Let My Creativity Drown (And It Didn’t Come Back to Haunt Me)” →

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